New Delhi, Dec. 23 -- By now, most people know this the hard way. A speaker that sounds great at low volume can fall apart the moment a room fills up. Bass quickly gets muddy while vocals disappear. Someone keeps nudging the volume higher, hoping it will fix the problem. It rarely does. Choosing a speaker for a New Year party is less about loudness and more about how sound behaves under pressure. That's where specs start to matter, but only if you understand what they actually change in a real room.

If your New Year plan involves a small group in a living room or balcony, the JBL Flip 6 remains one of the safest picks. On paper, it uses a two-way speaker system with a racetrack-shaped woofer and a separate tweeter. In practice, this keep...